All I can say is if you want to improve at something seek out the best advice you can get and try to follow it. If I was studying golf and Tiger Woods was willing to coach me, that would be the best opportunity I could hope for. If I wanted to improve my jump shot and Kobe Bryant had some spare time to work with me, that would be fantastic.

Well, guess what, if you are an investor there is a wealth of information available, and you can learn from the best. The best is Warren Buffett and you should do what he does. That is what I have been trying to do. I have been discussing Buffett in many of my stories and reminding people that he is the master and if you are doing anything else you are missing the point. Sure Smush Parker is also a starting guard for the Los Angeles Lakers, and that is amazing because the odds of being a starting guard in the NBA are astronomically small, but I would rather learn from Kobe.

So you can quote anybody you want and search far and wide for opportunities, but if you consider yourself a shrewd investor and are not studying Buffett you are making a mistake.

This morning I'm getting heckled by my friends for my story last week about railroad stocks: Serious Money: Freight Railroads - BNI, CSX, UNP & more, which was followed by Bloomberg's story as reported by Jonathan Berr: Warren Buffett hits the rails, stating that Warren Buffett is now the major shareholder of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. (NYSE: BNI).

Then I read that my colleague Georges Yared penned Is Dow Chemical next?, discussing the possibility that it might be acquired. You can read my December story Dow Chemical: a solid pick for 2007 and the January follow-up with Dow Jones OK, but Dow Chemical better, if you are looking at it today.

I have bought stocks that ended up in the Berkshire Hathaway portfolio before, but in the case of the railroads I had not acted yet and now they are being bid up, so while they are probably still value plays, they were better last week.

Oh well, I will have to look more closely when the fervor dies down.

Buffett is almost always by my side some way, a story, a book, a quote -- the Annual Report right now. I will end with a quote from that report. Warren, again this year bemoans the fees and charges that investment houses and advisors are removing from the pockets of investors, which is a big rip-off (my words not his). He summarized by sharing an old adage: "When someone with experience proposes a deal to someone with money, too often the fellow with money ends up with the experience, and the fellow with the experience ends up with the money."

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the vice president for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. Check out his other posts for BloggingStocks here.